How Do I Get Rid of these Thoughts? (page 2)

xjwms

For me I call it

De - program

Blondie has the right idea.....replace with better thoughts

Think of all the good things you want in your life...if you have to write them down...or post them here..replace former thoughts is an effort.

Gamaliel

jwfacts,

You said,

Everytime I see a birthday party or Christmas on TV I think "ohh, if I was a JW I would think they were pagan, and not really having fun."

One suggestion is to participate more, at least if your conscience would allow you yourself to enjoy it. Host a few more birthday parties. Find excuses to participate in your own or someone else's Christmas parties. You are seeing these things from a distanced position, according to your words.

Remember that holidays, special days and birthdays, to most of the world, are just excuses to do something nice for other people, and/or enjoy the fact that others have an excuse to do something nice for you. Everyone needs a gift-giving season (or similar occasions) to feel like they are participating in community and family.

BTW, a sociological or psychological approach, like the one I just suggested, can also cause one to distance their own participation, similar to the intellectualized or rationalized ex-religious approach that you speak of. One advantage is that it is much more generalized. And speaking of the advantage of generalization, instead of focusing on how you might have thought as a JW, how about weaning away from that specificity by remembering that this is how anyone might think having come from a fundamentalist approach or narrow belief system. Try to see how much of that goes on in all parts of the world, and how useful change is hampered by leftover prejudices of all kinds. You'll see that this JW experience is not so different from certain issues that all of humankind have to deal with, and you'll feel less inclined to keep focusing on just your own version of that same general experience.

When I speak to someone at work and they say they got drunk or wasted on the weekend I think "oooh, if i was a JW I would be offended by that, but i don't really care anymore."

There are certain behaviours that you may never wish to fully endorse, and your stance on some of them may merely be neutral, or as you say "don't really care anymore". But I'd think it's useful to just practice a smile in response even if you have no similar experiences you think you can draw on. As a lot of other people suggested, I think I'd try to consciously remember a specifically planned upbuilding thought of some kind that is unrelated to your former JW frame of reference.

Good luck. In my case it paid to be married to someone who was much better at releasing her JW prejudices than I was.

Cheers,
Gamaliel

the dreamer dreaming

ideal fantasies are implanted from perhaps even before birth.... many of them are hidden some are in plain sight...

the JWs seem to work by planting the ideal fantasy JW into our minds and having us compare everything we and others do to this magical super man, servant of God, Jesus [if they are pressed]... but the magical JW is more than Jesus... he carries a JW approved sachal filled with watchtowers, makes all five meetings [are they still five?] and prepares for them when he is not actively seeking out new additions to his spiritual family... he takes the lead in his home and disciplines his children with love...etc.etc... the uber-dub is very much alive within us for a long time after seeing that he is a sham.... though part of us may still admire him because of what we considered the good qualities of all humans even before becoming a JW because of other ideals that society, tradition and our own empathic system developed on its own.

Spectrum

JWfacts,
I wouldn't worry about it, time will erase these thoughts from your mind. I remember three years after I had faded from JWs I was offered to sign a birthday card, I did it but felt guilty. I'll sign anything now!

Wasanelder Once

That's just stinkin thinkin.

Live life and enjoy.... I used to give my mom a rash of crap about those chocolate bunnies at easter time. She would buy them for my brother in law who had a habit of eating them that was worse than a heroin addiction. Now that she is dead I'd give anything to see her buy one now.

Let the Witnoid thinking leak from your mind.....

In time you will be free of the bad ju ju....

W.Once

juni

Think of how much time it took to build and maintain those thoughts...it makes sense it would take some time to change them; actually the best thing for me is to replace them with better thoughts.

This was my thought. And it will happen.

Juni

LittleToe

I'll sign anything now!

~hands Spectrum a blank cheque~

How Do I Get Rid of these Thoughts?

xjwms

Gamaliel

the dreamer dreaming

Spectrum

Wasanelder Once

juni

LittleToe

poppers

Spectrum

jwfacts

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